


Jiggery-Pokery

by fannishliss



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-16
Updated: 2011-10-16
Packaged: 2017-11-27 09:19:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/660317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fannishliss/pseuds/fannishliss





	Jiggery-Pokery

<b>Title</b>: Jiggery-Pokery  
pairing: Nine/Rose  
rating: g  
challenge: 85, for 1.2 "The End of the World"  
word count = 2200

_Jiggery-pokery — sleight-of-hand, deception, trickery.   She'd gone for a ride with a stranger, and if he'd offered candy, she'd've wolfed it down without a moment's hesitation._

 

~*?*~

 

"The paper's slightly psychic — shows them whatever I want them to see," the Doctor said, easily deceiving the tall blue alien.

"I'm the Doctor and this is Rose.  She's my plus one — is that all right?"  he said, with an open, engaging smile.

Trouble was, Rose knew he was lying.  But if she hadn't known, then she'd never have known.  His lie was so casual, so inconsequential to him, that it looked as though, in his head, it was just as good as true.

The Doctor had told her so many outrageous things, and so many of them had turned out to be true, that she'd just begun to believe everything he said.  But now, she began to wonder just how often he lied.  Did he lie to her?  About little, innocent things?  About bigger things?  About everything?

What if their meeting hadn't actually been coincidence? How likely was it, really, that she had somehow gotten between him and the Nestene Consciousness four separate times?  Didn't that, you know, strain credulity?  beggar belief?  Pull the other one, Doctor!

"Where are you from?"  Rose finally demanded.

"All over the place," he said offhandedly.  Would he ever give a question a straightforward answer?  

Perhaps if she came at him sideways.  "They all speak English," she tried.

"No, you just hear English. It's the gift of the Tardis— telepathic field, gets inside your brain, translates."   That wasn't evasive — that was alarming!

"It's inside my brain?" she asked, a cold chill running down her back.  

"Well, in a good way,"   he said, at least having the grace to look a little sheepish.

"Your machine gets inside my head.  It gets inside and it changes my mind and you didn't even ask,"  she accused. What had it suggested to her? What had it made her think?  She remembered walking into the blue box the first time — the feeling of something alien taking note of her, measuring her up — she'd thought it was just her imagination.  And when the Doctor was piloting, she'd felt an urge, like the urge she got when she ran with him, to follow his lead, to keep by his side, to help him and keep him safe.  Was that her urge — or was it the Tardis's?  What had his machine really done to her?

"I didn't think about it like that,"  he argued.   That's what he would say, right?  Just one drink, it'll help you relax!  Oh, she'd heard that one before!

"Who are you then, Doctor?"  He was stretched out on the observation platform, looking sinfully attractive, arranged just as though he had no idea how gorgeous he was — staring at her with his big, innocent blue eyes.  Well, she wasn't having it!  She'd get to the bottom of this.  "What are you called — what sort of alien are you?"    All the other aliens had been identified — at least somewhat.  Even the walking, talking Trees and that weird purple Max of Balmoral came from somewhere.  

"I'm just the Doctor,"  he said lightly.  

"From what planet?" she pressed.

"Well, it's not as if you'd know where it is!"  

That got her back up.  Just because she didn't know didn't mean she wouldn't like to be told!  "Where are you from?" she insisted.  

"What does it matter?"  

"Tell me who you are!"  She knew how much she sounded like her mum right then, but getting at the truth of him was too important for her to back down.

"This is who I am, right here, right now. All right?"  Now he was really angry.  Why? Showing his true colors, she feared.    "All that counts is here and now — and this is me!" he shouted.  

That wasn't good enough — not when you've taken a girl five million years into the future to watch her planet burn and explode.   "Yeah, and I'm here too cause you brought me here, so just tell me!"  

He violently sprang to his feet and turned his back to her.  He was furious — just because she wanted to know where he was from.  What if he was dangerous?  She was five million years in the future.  He could do anything he felt like and she would have absolutely no way to fight back or get away.

But the way he turned away from her, hiding his anger, calmed her a little.  He hadn't threatened her, he'd just lost his temper.  He'd been angry before, on the Tardis when the Nestene Consciousness's signal had faded.  He was an extremely emotional person, but so far, not violent. She'd known violent men, blokes who were just plain mean — she'd seen their women limping round the estate, extra makeup to hide the bruises — and she knew in her gut that the Doctor wasn't like that.  

She backed off. "As my mate Shireen says, don't argue with the designated driver... can't exactly call for a taxi."

That made him flinch a bit.  Good.  Then he reached for her cell phone and trained his sonic device on it.   "A little bit of jiggery-pokery..."  he muttered.

"Is that a technical term, jiggery-pokery," she laughed.

"Yeah, I came first in jiggery-pokery, what about you?"  he said.

She played along with him, but the problem was, hadn't he just done it again?  Turned the conversation around with a bit of flash?  Jiggery-pokery — sleight-of-hand, deception, trickery. Was it a hint, or a warning?

It made Rose nervous.  She wanted to trust him.  She did trust him, despite herself.  She'd gone for a ride with a stranger — and if he'd offered candy, she'd've wolfed it down without a moment's hesitation.

Rose had watched enough telly to know plenty of pop psychology.  She realized that his saving her life had affected her — obviously!  Running together, fighting the Nestene Consciousness, feeling the adrenaline high and laughing beside him while she came down — corporate executives would've paid millions for a team-building retreat with bonding experiences half so effective. Then too, this trip to the future was classic Stockholm Syndrome —  far from home, isolated, and the Doctor the only person to turn to, she'd rationalize his behavior and justify that everything he'd done was for her own benefit.  

But she didn't need to rationalize, did she?  He'd never harmed her. He hadn't kidnapped her.  He'd've disappeared forever if she hadn't run to him when he asked.  There was something more between them than bonding over moments of high stress.  There was something in his eyes  he tried to play down with a laugh and a manic change of topic.  The look he'd given her when she refused him to go with him at first, Mickey clinging to her legs like responsibilities personified — he'd been heartbroken.  The loneliness and the grief she'd seen convinced her that he wasn't just some mad adventurer.  There was something really wrong with the way he threw himself into danger, the way he didn't seem to care if he lived or died.  She'd known adrenaline junkies from around the estate — girls who shoplifted for the rush of evading detection, blokes who got into fights or accepted life-threatening dares. To her, the Doctor seemed different.  Adrenaline wasn't his goal, but maybe the excitement was a respite from the emotions that took him over if he ever slowed down enough to think.  She'd seen it more than once now — the moment he remembered.  She had to admit her curiosity.  The man was a mystery, like a silhouette superimposed with a giant red question mark.  She had to know the man at the heart of the mystery.  She had to.

But beyond the burning curiosity, underneath the psychology and the reasoning, there was the simple fact that she was drawn to him.  He was fascinating, and different, and alien (in a good way) — but her mind opened up when he looked at her with that piercing blue stare.  All the parts of her brain that had been bogged down in normal routines and everyday reality came alive when he spoke.  He asked her real questions that need real answers.  He challenged her to let her mind soar, to make connections and have ideas.  He reawakened her dreams, resurrected possibilities her life on the estate had taught her to bury.  She'd run away with Jimmy Stone and look how that had ended up.  But had she learned her lesson?  No!  Risking her future on the Doctor was the chance of a lifetime — and besides, as long as he really wasn't a maniac, what did she have to be afraid of?

It was after he'd saved her and brought Cassandra back that she saw exactly what she was meant to be afraid of.  His determination, his focused glare — he had no mercy.  He judged Cassandra guilty, and he stood back and let her die.  

Rose had seen him inform Jabe's friends of something —  the elegant tree woman was gone.  The Doctor had lost her.  Clearly he didn't take the loss lightly.  It could've been her: she knew that.  It could easily have been her own mum the Doctor would've spoken to with jaw clenched and eyes cast down — a few brief words of heartfelt condolence before he strode away forever.

Rose felt tied in knots.  Her palms sweaty, her stomach sick — she wanted so badly to believe in him — his heroism, the obvious way he cared so much, the pain in him she could already see ran so deep — but if he kept it all secret, hidden behind glib talk and easy deceit, that was one thing she couldn't handle.  

She needed the truth.  If he told her the truth, everything else would fall into place.  After he'd taken her hand and led her away from the awful sight of the Earth flying to pieces, his compassion made her hope that somehow, they could build a bridge from his shame and solitude to her open heart.  

"You think it'll last forever — the people, the cars and concrete — but it won't. One day it's all gone. Even the sky." His face was stark, still amidst the turmoil of the London crowd.  He seemed composed, but the very lack of emotion in his voice betrayed the depth of what he was feeling.  She stood and watched him, listening.   

"My planet's gone," he continued. His voice was flat, matter of fact, so calm on the surface, but it still seemed to echo with his grief-stricken screams.  "Dead. It burned like the Earth.  It's just rocks and dust.  Before its time."

"What happened?"  she asked him, gently.    

"There was a war, and we lost."  He seemed to be gazing into the past, his blue eyes steel with the horrors of memory.

"A war with who?"

He didn't answer.  He wasn't evading her any more, but it was clear some questions were still too painful for him to try to answer.  

"What about your people?"    

"I'm a Time Lord.  I'm the last of the Time Lords. They're all gone.   I'm the only survivor.  I'm left traveling on my own cause there's no one else."

He looked so old in that moment.  She had no idea, really, how old he might be.  A time traveler— he might live forever, mightn't he?

"There's me," she said, aching for him, her own eyes burning with the tears he clearly refused to shed.

"You've seen how dangerous it is.  Do you want to go home?" he offered.

Did he really want her to go?  Did he? "I don't know.  I want..." but she couldn't say out loud what she really wanted.   "Oh, do you smell chips?"

"Yeah!  Yeah?"  Like the sun from behind a cloud, his face broke again into joy.  She'd done that, turned it around for him, helped him forget his terrible loneliness, if only for a moment.  

"I want chips," she said, decisively — anything to keep that smile on his face.

"Me too!" he declared, grinning.

"All right then, before you get me back in that box, chips it is and you can pay," she said teasing.  Would he?

"No money," he said, smiling broadly.  Oi, the wanker!  He expected the universe to just fall into place for his benefit, didn't he?  But maybe little, everyday joys weren't so much for him to expect in return for saving the world.

Truly, he was stunning when he smiled. And she had done that!  She could live forever on the feeling his smile awakened inside her.  

"What sort of date are you?" she mocked, laughing.  "Come on then, tightwad, chips are on me. We've only got five billion years till the shops close!"

His hand closed around hers as they walked on, and she could feel in his hand around hers all the things he couldn't yet say.  

What she really wanted, more than anything, was to know the whole truth of this captivating man who called himself the Doctor--and if she'd learned anything, it was that she wouldn't rest until she knew it all.  


 


End file.
